Opportunities for Aerogel Materials for Energy Conversion and Storage
Résumé
Aerogels are fascinating materials coming from drying (in general in supercritical conditions) of gels synthesized through a sol-gel process. They are nanostructured highly porous materials with high specific area levels. They offer a large range of chemical compositions, from mineral to organic sides via organic-inorganic hybrids. Because of their high specific surface, they have been initially studied for heterogeneous catalysis. Then, the large majority of the works have been dedicated to silica aerogels as brand new promising thermal superinsulators because of their thermal conductivity far below the one of ... air. This situation must not hide that aerogels are also really promising for various other applications, particularly within the field of energy storage and conversion. Among others can be set off the intensive studies on i) monolithic carbon aerogels as electrode of Proton-Exchange Membrane Fuel Cell and Electrochemical Double Layer Capacitors (EDLC also known as supercapacitors) and ii) vanadium oxide aerogels for enhanced energy storage in Li-ion batteries. Of course, the review will address a wider panel of potential applications but will mainly focus on carbon aerogels.